Proper, sharp knives make cooking a pleasure

A small, all-purpose knife designed for intricate work, such as deveining shrimp or skinning a small fruit or vegetable. The blades are thin and short, about 5 to 10 centimetres long. Use a paring knife for peeling, paring, coring and pitting or removing the tops of strawberries, or any small slicing jobs like garlic cloves.

Price: $5-$100.

Chef's

A utility knife useful for everything from cutting meat to dicing vegetables. It's considered the most important, go-to and versatile knife to have in the kitchen. It comes in several lengths, but an 20-centimetre blade is a good standard size (Anything bigger than 22 centimetres is hard to control, chef Tom Azar said.). The blade should be wide at the heel end (near the handle) and tapers to a point at the tip end.

Price: $20-$200.

Serrated

Designed with "teeth" that cut bread without crushing it, a serrated knife is great for baked goods. It also works like a charm for cutting fruits and vegetables that have a firm skin but a soft interior, like tomatoes. Use it in a sawing motion, without applying much downward pressure.

Price: $10-$90.

Santoku

Similar to a chef's knife, and just as versatile, a santoku knife features a flat blade with grooves near the sharp edge to prevent food from sticking to it. Excellent for cutting vegetables into even cubes or matchsticks.

The metal-on-metal swoosh-swoosh sound of cooks honing their knife blades on steel rods keeps a near-constant rhythm in Tom Azar's kitchen at the Lauderdale Yacht Club in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

Keeping knives sharp, straight and nick-free is a smarter way to cook than using dull blades, Azar said.

"You'll work twice as hard with a dull knife," said Azar, executive chef of the private Fort Lauderdale club who formerly cooked at Emeril's in Miami Beach and City Hall the Restaurant in Miami. "A sharp knife gives you cleaner cuts," making you work more efficiently.

Plus, he said, a blunted blade can lead to injury-causing slips.

"A dull knife will hack up everything," Azar said.

While cutlery experts, restaurant chefs and experienced home cooks suggest routine DIY touch-ups with a honing steel and sharpener, they also recommend periodic professional sharpenings.

For most at-home cooks, twice-a-year visits to a sharpening shop will leave blades so fresh and fine-tuned that they remind us what a joy it is to chop, cube, slice and dice.

In the market for new knives?

German and Japanese brands known for their quality, value and reliability include Wusthof, Shun, Zwilling J.A. Henckels and Global.

And four kinds of blades that should be in any set are a chef's knife, a serrated knife, a paring knife and santoku knife.

No matter whether you have a new set of knives or ones just back from a sharpening, proper storage can greatly extend their lives. Keep in mind:

-- Keep them out of the dishwasher.

The harsh detergent and heavy jostling can damage and dull knife blades. Instead, carefully wash with a sponge using warm, soapy water.

-- Don't leave them soaking.

Someone could get cut by a knife hidden at the bottom of a murky pool of dishwater. Or, other utensils and dishes could blunt the blade.

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